The Mercy Papers Audiobook

" I can understand the pain of the loss of a parent. I lost my mom when I was five. I felt Robin's pain. I can also say that I never let the lost of my mom become a way of life. Wallowing in pain is never a good thing. "

" Disjointed and difficult to keep track of. But that's how it is when you're in such an emotional state. Robin hadn't come anywhere near acceptance by the end of the narrative. There, she inserted an unusual gift - 12 blank pages. No instructions on what to do with this gift. But the obvious use is for the start of the reader's own grief journal. Assuming that the reader is in the same boat. (But why would anyone not grieving want to read this book?) Even in a library book, those pages cry out to be used. But nobody has yet, at least in this copy. (They have 8 copies of the book, and I was the 60-somethingth in line, so it's passed through a number of hands already. And now there are over 80 people in line!) "

" A quick, depressing read. "

" My friend Mateo had a good point when he asked why I even read this book. I dunno. "Nothing better to do" doesn't really have the ring of truth. Maybe it was the popsicle sticks on the cover. Whatever the reason, I regreted it immensely--so much that I kept reading, hoping it would get bettr. It didn't. It's not so much that the writing is bad (although it's a bit MLA-stylized)...it's rather that the writer is so venomous toward almost everyone and especially toward the somewhat hapless hospice nurse who, you get the sense, probably has her OWN story to tell about X patient's witch of a daughter. Now the question is--why am I spending more time writing this review? "

" This book stands out for its emotional honesty. The last three weeks of her mother's life provides the frame. You know she's going to die, but you're on pins and needles anyway. "

" This book started out as the author's journal during the time she spent with her family just before her mother passed away. This is grief, raw and up close. Her openness and honesty is breath taking. "

" Well written book. Romm chronicles her mother's last 3 weeks of her life and her battle with breast cancer. Romm describes the daily ins and outs of being a caregiver to a cancer patient and her portrayal is blunt and delicate, without being oversentimental. "

" This book is painfully beautiful. The author is daring in that she has written a book that claims rights to grief in a way that evades the culturally received language for grief, as well as looking death in the face, angrily. It is a courageous book. "

" Short and not very well developed. "

" Another book that hit a little too close to home. Don't know why I insist on reading these but I do. "

" Woman in her twenties comes home for her mother's final three weeks of life. Lots of anger and very little hope. The metaphor of building a boat for her mother to leave on was poignant. "

" I have no idea if this book is as good as I deemed it to be, because it was, for me, essentially an autobiography. To a tee. "

" powerful and short memoir of the death of the authors mother from breast cancer. I found it moving, sometimes gruesome as death truly is, and a portrait of a family coping best they can with saying goodbye to a strong mother. "

" Spent an afternoon reliving the most painful time of my life. Exhausting but cathartic. "

" I found this book disturbing. It kept my interest in the hopes the author would find some good somewhere in all that she was encountering during the last weeks of her mothers life. She seemed like a woman who is spoiled and with no hope. "

" Kind of a self centered memoir on grief -- a little too much "woe is me/what about me". I'd recommend The Year of Magical Thinking any day for a book about grief, recovery etc. "

" This book is so visceral, so hard to read, so true. My major reaction was a very selfish one to a) wish that I never have to go through this and b) appreciate my parents being here and being healthy. "

" I seem to have developed a strange affinity for memoirs about illness (preferably mental or terminal) and/or grief (preferably raw and/or wallowing). And thus I found Robin Romm's book about losing her mother to cancer unusually compelling. "

" I couldn't put this book down. Definitely not easy to read, but in the end, comforting to know that my feelings around the recent loss of my father are universal to everyone experiencing loss of a parent. I cried buckets- it was very cathartic. "

" I thought The Mercy Papers was fantastic. "

" Not quite what you would expect in a book of grieving, and yet true to life and somehow uplifting in the end. "

" Great book about the process of loss. NOT grief. Grief also... but really the process of losing someone. If you're like me, you will cry. A lot. "

" I loved this book. Robin does such a great job of sharing what it feels like to love a parent while loosing them. I appreciate her strength and candidness. She is a beautiful writer. "

" Short and not very well developed. "

" Read after a family death - some of it rings true, but I didn't really like it. "

" A memoir written by a daughter of a woman dying of cancer. I came away sad for the author. "

" Good writing but the narrator was infuriatingly honest. Her self-centeredness was depressing. "

" This book was hard to get through. It's a memoir of a girl tending to her dying mother, and a 9 year illness zeroing in on the last 3 weeks. I found myself cringeing at the raw observations. "

" Another book that hit a little too close to home. Don't know why I insist on reading these but I do. "

" An unflinching look at loss, written beautifully. "

" I thought this book was a big let down. It is the memoir of the three weeks leading up to her mother's death from cancer. But it seemed very selfish and self absorbed, very forced and very distant. I didn't feel a lot of love for the mother from the author. "

" A heartbreaking look at the loss of one's mother. Romm details the last three weeks of her mother's life as she dies of cancer. Sometimes I felt the language held us at a distance - but maybe her grief was putting a screen between feelings and words. "